Author: Rajeev Srinivasan
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: November 19, 2002
URL: http://www.rediff.com/news/2002/nov/19rajeev.htm
Most of us studied the Alfred Tennyson
poem 'The Charge of the Light Brigade' in school. The Battle of Thermopylae
we read of with goose bumps. We all know about Custer's Last Stand. And
the battle cry 'Remember the Alamo!' resonates with us.
Yet, none of us has heard of the
13th Kumaon Battalion's Last Stand at Rezang La, Ladakh, in the Battle
of Chushul, on November 18, 1962. I think this is a great pity.
For, let us remind ourselves of
these examples of heroism:
* The Battle of Thermopylae in ancient
Greece in 480 BCE, where 300 Spartans under Leonidas stopped a Persian
army of 250,000 at a narrow mountain pass. They died to the last man, but
provided enough time for the rest of the Greek army to escape to fight
another day.
* The 13th Light Brigade of the
British Army at Balaclava, the Crimea, in 1854. Six hundred and seventy-three
men rode at Russian artillery and were decimated.
* At the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas,
in 1836, several hundred Texans held out against the Mexican Army before
they were killed to the last man.
* Custer's Last Stand was the Battle
of Little Bighorn, 1876, in Montana where the Sioux nation under Chief
Sitting Bull wiped out George Custer and 265 men.
And finally:
* The C company of the 13th Kumaon
Battalion, under Major Shaitan Singh (Param Vir Chakra, Posthumous) held
off a fierce Chinese attack on November 18, 1962, at the Rezang La heights
that they held. Massively outnumbered and outgunned, the defenders died
almost to the last man, and expended their last round. All 114 men were
killed or wounded. But they succeeded in blunting the Chinese assault,
killing as many as a thousand Chinese in the process at Rezang La and at
nearby Gurung Hill. Thereafter, the Chinese did not push further towards
the Chushul plain. It was a critical checkpoint on a potential Chinese
advance on Leh.
The story of 13th Kumaon is the
kind of thing that would make the patriotic Indian stand tall with tears
in his eyes. Yet, we do not stand in silence for a moment in memory of
Major Shaitan Singh and his gallant men. No poet eulogizes them as Tennyson
did the Light Brigade. There is only a small memorial at the site, which
says:
How can a Man die Better than facing
Fearful Odds,
For the Ashes of His Fathers and
the Temples of His Gods,
To the sacred memory of the Heroes
of Rezang La,
114 Martyrs of 13 Kumaon who fought
to the Last Man,
Last Round, Against Hordes of Chinese
on 18 November 1962.
Built by All Ranks 13th Battalion,
The Kumaon Regiment.
I am indebted to the Bharat-Rakshak
web site for this information as well as a long article on the Battle of
Chushul by L N Subramanian. Yet, why is there nothing written about them
along the lines of what Tennyson did, as in these excerpts from his stirring
poem:
Half a league half a league
Half a league onward...
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred...
Not tho' the soldier knew
Some one had blunder'd;
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do & die...
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd and thunder'd;...
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wonder'd.
Honour the charge they made!
Honour the Light Brigade...
Why have Indians so consistently
ignored the great sacrifices made by our soldiers? Why isn't the story
of the valiant 13th Kumaon a part of every child's textbooks? Why have
we let these brave men die unwept, unmourned, and unsung? Just as we let
thousands of soldiers die in Kashmir, in Kargil, everywhere, they are mere
cannon fodder. India needs a draft, so people in power feel the pain of
their children dying for the nation.
I think I know why there is no official
celebration of the Battle of Chushul: the government can hardly bother
to honour the Unknown Soldier on Kargil Day. Then how will they remember
something that happened forty years ago?
There is also an element of shame.
Congress governments were unwilling to talk about 1962 because it brings
out the fact that 'someone had blunder'd' and that was their deity, Jawaharlal
Nehru, along with his defence minister, V K Krishna Menon. Admitting this
would leave them shamefaced, so they just let the soldiers 'but do and
die'. Even the current government is unwilling to publish the Henderson
Brooks report. Why? It will at least shed some light on what happened.
The media in India should have taken
this up in the absence of governmental action. But the media, influenced
by Chinese propaganda, has portrayed the 1962 war on Chinese terms. Aping
the Xinhua propaganda agency, Indian media mavens have taken the stand
that the war was India's fault. As though Indians, with no mountain divisions,
would go over the Himalayas and attack the Chinese in Tibet and Ladakh
and Arunachal Pradesh!
The Marxists in India say the 1962
affair was an internal matter for the Chinese, as they have generously
'awarded' Arunachal Pradesh to China. The Chinese believe this, too. They
told the CM of Arunachal Pradesh recently that he did not need a visa to
go to China, as he was a Chinese citizen! Americans, Britons and Australians
accept China's lies, for it suits them to support China.
But we know that all this isn't
true. Individual Indians must remember the 13th Kumaon. As the Quebec motto
goes, Je me souviens: I remember. And I shall always remember those brave
men of C Company who died in a frozen wasteland. For me. For you.
